Joker's Destiny
by imaginarysong
Summary: Kojima Ran has moved to Namimori recently. He makes his way to Namimori Middle School and meets a few people.
1. Chapter 1 First Encounter

Joker's Destiny

By: imaginarysong

_Chapter 1- First Encounter_

_Why do things have to be so complicated?_ a teenage boy sighed to himself. His dark red-brown hair glinted in the morning sunshine as he made his way towards Namimori Middle School.

He just moved to Japan a few days ago. Actually, he and his family originally lived in Japan, but they had to move to America because of his parents' jobs. Nevertheless, they would always come back to visit their home country every summer and spent their time staying at his grandparent's house.

However, due to recent events, his parents decided to have him attend school in Japan. It was bad enough that he barely had any experience in attending a Japanese school; his parents accidentally placed some inaccurate information on his school transcript, which they had already sent to Namimori.

He wasn't sure about what to expect but he wasn't all that nervous either. As he continued to walk down the side walk, he tried to remember the details of his mother's instructions and advice to him about his stay in Japan…

_Thump. _

"Whoops! Sorry about that." While he was busy thinking, he didn't notice the girl who was walking in front of him.

"Oh! It's okay." the girl turned to face him. She was a bit shorter than him with short bright orange hair and big golden eyes. A look of interest appeared on her face.

"I haven't seen you before. Did you just move into Namimori?"

"Yeah," he replied. Was it that easy to tell?

"I'm Sasagawa Kyoko," she told him. "And you are…?"

"Kojima Ran. Nice to meet you," he bowed his head.

"Same here!" Sasagawa smiled. They continued to walk down the path, together.

"I can see that you're going to our school," Sasagawa said, taking notice of his uniform. "Do you know what class you are in?"

Kojima fished a piece of piece of paper out of his pocket and took a look.

"Umm, 1-B. You?"

"Sorry, I'm in 1-A." Her face fell a little bit. "Don't worry; I'm sure you will make friends quickly. You seem like a nice guy," she added, seeing Kojima's slightly troubled face.

"Thanks. I hope so." Kojima replied earnestly.

After they walked for a few more moments, Kojima could feel the pounding of footsteps behind him. Someone was heading in their direction at an alarming rate! Not wanting to alarm his new friend, he snuck a peek over his shoulder.

He raised his eyebrows when he saw that a half-naked brown-haired guy was yelling while running down the street. The running person seemed to be a boy around his own age whose eyes were somewhat angry, determined, and maniac-like. The fact that the guy was only wearing underwear while he was running made him look even more bizarre. He wasn't even sure that the speed that the dude was running at was possible. In no time at all, underpants man passed by.

"Huh? Was that…" Sasagawa trailed off.

"You know him…?" Kojima asked.

"Hey." a guy with black hair greeted Kyoko, interrupting him.

"Mochida-senpai." Kyoko recognized him.

Both boys studied each other. Mochida gave Kojima a threatening glare. Kojima simply smirked at him. Mochida gritted his teeth.

Before the upperclassman could say anything, Kojima spoke. "Sasagawa-san, is it okay with you if I go to school without you? I need to get there as soon as possible so I can talk with the teacher before class starts."

Reluctantly, she nodded. "See you at school Kojima-san." She walked with the senpai as Ran went ahead, taking a faster pace.


	2. Chapter 2 Underpants Man

Joker's Destiny

By imaginarysong

_Chapter 2- Underpants Man_

_1-B._

Kojima Ran stood outside the classroom. He slid the door open and peered inside. Unfortunately, the teacher wasn't there yet, just a handful of his to-be classmates. He approached the people nearest to the door who happened to be a pair of girls chatting away about their weekends or something.

"Umm, excuse me, could one of you tell me where the office is?" Kojima asked.

Both girls turned towards him and stared.

"Uh…is something wrong?" Kojima felt awkward.

"Looking for the office?" someone behind Kojima repeated. The owner of the voice belonged to a tall, good looking guy with short, spiky black hair who was holding a baseball bat over his shoulder.

"Yamamoto-kun!" the girls squealed. Yamamoto waved hello to them.

"Yeah, could you tell me where I can find it?" Ran continued, getting annoyed with the girls.

"You go downstairs, take a right turn, go straight for a bit, and take another right turn. I think." Yamamoto smiled and scratched the back of his head. "Haha, even if I'm wrong, you'll be able to find it somewhere around there."

Ran relaxed a bit and smiled at the guy's cheerfulness. "Okay, thanks a lot." He then made his way downstairs with directions imprinted in his mind.

_Down. Right. Straight. Right. _

Thankfully, Yamamoto gave Kojima accurate directions. He went inside the office and asked the secretary about his transcript information.

"I'm sorry. The person who is in charge of handling transfer student transcripts is not here today. I think that he might be out for the week because of a fever." she told him. "You should hurry and go, class is about to start."

Kojima mentally groaned. _Great…_

He thanked the lady and left the office, tracing his way back upstairs. As he was walking up the stairs, a bell suddenly started ringing. "Shoot!" He said to himself, as he started to walk faster. He reached the classroom and pulled the door open to find the classroom filled with students and the teacher looking at him quizzically. "Sorry I'm late!" he said, slightly panting.

A familiar voice rang out in the silence. "Kojima-san?"

Kojima turned towards the voice to find that Kyoko was in the classroom.

"Sasagawa-san!" he said in surprise. Then it hit him. "Sumimasen!" Kojima apologized, "I got the wrong classroom!"

The class 1-A and their teacher laughed good-naturedly. Kojima smiled shyly at his own stupidity and closed the door as he left the classroom. He found classroom 1-B next to 1-A and opened the door, still feeling embarrassed that he went into the wrong room.

"Oh yeah," the teacher of 1-B said as he saw Kojima, "let me introduce our transfer student! He recently moved from America to Japan. This is Kojima Ran."

The class immediately buzzed with interest. Kojima could catch a few words here and there.

"Hey, that's the guy from this morning!"

"He doesn't look American."

"He's really cute."

"Why don't you sit in the empty seat next to Nakano? Nakano, please raise your hand."

Kojima Ran sat in his desk and sighed from exhaustion. He didn't really find the classes too hard. Once it was break, a number of his classmates rushed over to meet him.

"Kojima-san, what's America like?"

"Is your English really good?"

"How do you like Namimori?"

After he answered most of their questions, his classmates settled down a bit. He listened to his them as they began talking about all sorts of stuff about school and Namimori. Clubs, sports, school idols, mean teachers, what not to order in the lunch line, what's popular, and other things like that. But a particular topic interested him the most out of all of them.

"Ne ne, did you hear about Dame Tsuna, Kyoko, and Mochida-senpai?" a girl asked her friend.

"Sasagawa-san?" Kojima asked, overhearing the girl's name.

"Yeah! You know her? Well anyways, I heard that Mochida-senpai is going to punish Dame Tsuna for embarrassing Kyoko at lunch today!"

"It's true," a boy piped up, "I saw what happened myself this morning!"

"Who's this Dame Tsuna?" Kojima asked curiously.


	3. Chapter 3 Found You

Joker's Destiny

By imaginarysong

_Chapter 3- Found You_

Kojima found himself leaning against the wall in the gym. He came along with some other of his classmates and a number of other students to witness the match.

Apparently, Mochida-senpai said that he would be waiting for Tsuna in the gym to settle the matter about dishonoring Sasagawa-san. Right now, they were waiting for Tsuna to arrive; Mochida-senpai was already decked out in his kendo gear.

Kojima had heard a lot about Dame Tsuna. Loser Tsuna was Sawada Tsunayoshi's nickname at school because of his low test scores and lack of athletic ability. He was also known for his tendency to fail at everything.

Kojima never thought that a person like that would actually be underpants man. He also would never have thought that underpants man was actually looking for Sasagawa-san and confessed to her in public.

He observed Mochida-senpai and frowned. He could tell that the upperclassman was confident that he would win. After all, he was probably more experienced in kendo than Sawada anyway.

_I hope that underpants man will win against this guy; he's getting on my nerves._ Kojima thought silently.

Kojima heard the cocky kendo guy question underpants man's tardiness. "Isn't Sawada here yet?"

"I bet he ran away," he heard someone nearby answer him. "Man, stupid Loser Tsuna."

To Kojima's surprise, the senpai laughed. "That means I win by default!" He continued to laugh.

_This guy is lamer than I thought…_

"Hey, Loser Tsuna is here!" someone shouted. The crowd started murmuring.

"He really came."

"He should've escaped while he could."

"Ah…underpants man is here." Kojima grinned. Now that he finally got a good look at him, all the stuff about Tsuna being a loser was beginning to sink in a little. The guy obviously looked really worried. _His legs are shaking…_ Kojima bit his lip.

"So here you are, perverted stalker. The heavens may forgive scum like you, but I will not! I shall punish you!"

Tsuna brought his hands up. "Wait, there's a reason for what happened…"

"I won't listen to excuses!" Mochida-senpai told him, directing his shinai, a wooden sword, at his opponent's face. Tsuna made a noise and backed away.

"Don't worry. I know that you're a beginner in kendo. So here's the match. If you can take one from me within ten minutes, you win. If you can't, I win.

"The prize is, of course… Sasagawa Kyoko!"

An alarm went off in Kojima's head. There was no way that he'd let that jerk have her.

"P-Prize?" Sasagawa-san repeated in anger.

"What a pig," a girl next to her said.

"Let's go, Sawada!" Mochida senpai declared, ignoring the girls.

Tsuna panicked and continued to back away.

"Tsuna!" Yamamoto, the guy who helped Kojima earlier, threw him a shinai. The nervous boy fumbled and barely caught it with his hands.

"DOOOORIIYYAAAAA!" Mochida-senpai immediately rushed towards the less-than-ready Tsuna. He raised his wooden sword and whacked Tsuna's shinai out of his hands. Tsuna yelped and fell to the gym floor from the force. He got up right away and started to run.

Kojima was slightly puzzled at Tsuna's reaction. He didn't know what to think. All the things that his classmates told him about Tsuna were becoming more of a reality to him.

_Is this guy really underpants man? _

Kojima was becoming even more confused as he watched Mochida-senpai chase Tsuna around the gym. The students watching them began to laugh.

_He's not running as fast as the first time I saw him. _Ran tilted his head to one side. _That's weird. Wouldn't he run as fast as possible so that he can make an escape from Mochida-senpai?_

"That's Dame Tsuna for you!" one of the boys nearby laughed. Sasagawa-san looked uneasy.

Mochida-senpai got close enough to Tsuna so that he could trip him. He hit one of Tsuna's legs and Tsuna fell to the floor once more.

Mochida-senpai stood over Tsuna, smiling in triumph as he raised his Shinai above his own head. "You're mine."

As the upperclassman was about to bring it down, Sasagawa-san shouted with her hands cupped over her mouth.

"Sawada-kun! Don't give up!"

Both boys looked at her in surprise. "Ky-Kyoko-chan…" Tsuna stammered.

_She's right underpants man, fight!_

"Fight like your life depends on it," a squeaky voice reached Kojima's ears. He whipped around. _Who said that?_

As Kojima was busy looking for the unknown person, a barely noticeable flash of red light made contact with Tsuna's head. The boy fell to the floor again.

"Take one! Do whatever it takes to get one!" Kojima suddenly heard.

He turned around to see Sawada up on his feet, half-naked with a flame on his head. Kojima didn't have much time to worry about what brought the sudden change in the boy who was known for being a loser. He was too caught up in observing the underpants man that he saw this morning. Tsuna started running while yelling a war cry as he closed the distance between him and Mochida-senpai.

Kyoko blinked in surprise.

"The pervert's back!"

"Underpants man!"

"Fool!" Mochida-senpai said, "You think petty tricks will work on me?" He finally brought his wooden sword down upon Tsuna's head.

However, an odd thing happened. Instead of dealing a blow on Tsuna's head, Tsuna's head broke the sword!

"What?" Mochida-senpai yelled in shock. Tsuna took the opportunity to jump on top of Mochida-senpai. He nailed Mochida-senpai to the floor by sitting on his stomach and raised his hand over his head as if he was going to cut a vegetable with a big knife.

"A chop?" Yamamoto guessed.

"He's going for the head!" the guy next to him concluded.

Tsuna yelled and brought his hand down. Kojima watched him with wide eyes. Instead of a chop like Yamamoto guessed, Tsuna's hand reached down grab a handful of Mochida-senpai's hair and jerked his hand up. Underpants man held a fistful of black hair in the air. Everyone stared, astonished and amazed.

"Forget one! I just took 100!" Tsuna yelled. He made eye contact with the judge. The judge flinched.

Ran tried to muffle his laughter. He couldn't hold it in for long. He laughed alongside the rest of his schoolmates.

"Tsuna used his head there."

"He never said what you were supposed to take afterall!"

Since the judge did not confirm Tsuna's victory, Tsuna turned towards Mochida-senpai once more.

"If this isn't enough…" Tsuna began and left his sentence unfinished, choosing instead to rip out more of Mochida-senpai's hair at a faster pace by using both of his hands.

The judge began freaking out.

_Dude, if you're not going to raise that red flag sooner, senpai will become bald! _Kojima thought. He started laughing again at the thought.

"P-Point! Red wins!" the judge said hastily, raising the flag.

The students went wild. Who would have expected that Dame Tsuna would win?

"Wow!"

"Tsuna won!"

"That was crazy, but you did well!"

"I see you in a whole new light! That was awesome!"

Kojima calmed down enough to see the flame on Tsuna's head disappear. He looked normal again, though he was breathing heavily.

Unfortunately for Mochida-senpai, the judge was too late. The now bald upperclassman lay twitching on the floor.

"Sawada-kun." Sawagawa-san approached Tsuna.

"Ky-Kyoko-chan…" Tsuna said nervously.

"Sorry about this morning." she said placing a hand on the back of her head, "My friends always tell me I don't know when to laugh."

Kojima saw Tsuna slump a little when she told him that. _Hmm…_

"You're amazing, Sawada-kun." Tsuna looked at her in surprise as the students were leaving the gym. "May I call you Tsuna-kun from now on?" Kyoko asked.

"O-Of course!" he answered. She smiled at him and waved goodbye as Kojima exited the gym with everyone else. A blue sky greeted him as he made his way back to the classroom.


	4. Chapter 4 Chance

Joker's Destiny

By imaginarysong

_Chapter 4- Chance_

The next morning, Kojima Ran was staring out the classroom window from his desk with boredom. Since he was late on his first day, he decided to go to school earlier than nesscesscary. He regretted his decision. Now he had nothing to do for the next thirty minutes.

He placed his hand under his chin, yawned, and drowsily blinked. Would walking around the school be a good idea?

Ran shook his head at himself and abandoned the idea immediately; he didn't want to repeat yesterday's events.

Ten minutes later, several boys entered the classroom, talking. They spotted Ran by himself in the room and waved. Kojima shyly waved back.

They sat in their assigned seats which happened to be close to his and continued their conversation. Nakano, the boy that Kojima sat next to happened to be one of the boys.

Ran decided to take a nap to pass the time. However, he could not help but listen to them as he attempted to fall asleep.

"Where's Hiroshi? Doesn't he have a volley ball match today?" he heard Nakano ask his friends.

"He told me that he got food poisoning yesterday night. He's not coming to school today," one of the guys told him.

"Well then. Takeru will certainly be happy to be able to substitute for him so soon."

"Takeru? I think he ate at Hiroshi's house yesterday…" his classmate trailed off.

"Do they even have a substitute for the substitute?" Nakano questioned with interest.

"I think so. That should be Kazuo if I remember correctly."

Another boy walked into the classroom towards them.

"Minoru," Nakano called out to him, "where's Kazuo? Don't you usually walk together to school with him?"

"Yeah. But his mom told me that he wouldn't be able to walk with me. He's sick with food poisoning," he replied with a troubled face. "Oh yeah, thanks for letting me borrow your pen the other day." Minoru took a pen out of his pocket and handed it to Nakano.

_Are you serious?_ Kojima felt sorry for the people who got food poisoning but could not help but feel amused by the coincidences. He lifted his head up from his napping position.

"So, does your class have a reserve for the reserve for the reserve?" Kojima spoke up out of curiosity.

"Kojima-san's got a point there," Nakano admitted.

"Hey, what about Tsuna?" one of the boys suggested.

Minoru's face lit up. "You know, he might be the best man for the job. He was really cool yesterday. I'll let Yamamoto know. Thanks guys!" he quickly left.

"Today's match is going to be fun to watch then. We've got to check it out."

After everyone came into the classroom, class finally began. In the middle of their algebra lesson, the teacher realized that he forgot to bring their homework worksheets that he copied in the printer room.

"Who wants to help me get them?" he asked the class. Immediately, several hands were up in the air. They wanted to take the opportunity to skip class, even though it would only be for a short period of time. Seeing his classmates' eagerness, Kojima felt compelled to raise his hand too. Before he knew it, he was picked and was on his way out of the classroom.

"It's one of the rooms close to the office. You'll be able to find it easily," the teacher told him. "If you still can't find it, just ask the office."

Ran wasn't too worried about getting lost this time. He found the place and spotted the pile of papers beside one of the printers.

As he turned at a corner after walking up the stairs, someone walked right into him. Both of them found themselves on the floor. Thankfully, the papers that Kojima were carrying didn't scatter all over the place. Several escaped from his hands but he managed to hold onto most of the pile.

"Watch where you're going," a silver-haired boy said in a menacing voice as he picked himself up. He dusted himself off while Kojima was busying himself with gathering the papers on the floor. There was a silence between the two. "Where's my apology?" he asked.

"Not giving you one," Kojima said automatically as he continued to pick up the papers, "I would have but you're arrogant and rude enough not to help me."

The boy clenched his fist. With the other hand, he swiftly gripped Kojima's collar. "Why you-"

"What are you guys doing?" a voice interrupted the silver-haired boy. A tall black-haired boy with sharp eyes approached them. Kojima finished up and stood before the two boys. Ran spotted the red band on the dark-haired boy's jacket sleeve.

It said _Disciplinary Committee _in golden words.

"Just an accident," Kojima informed him. "Don't worry, I'll be on my way back to class Mr. Disciplinary Committee guy."

"Hibari Kyoya." he told Kojima, sounding slightly amused.

"Hibari-san," Kojima repeated. He then bowed and walked away, leaving Hibari to deal with the rude person.


	5. Chapter 5 Surprise!

Joker's Destiny

By: imaginarysong

_Chapter 5- Surprise! (Part 1)_

_SMACK_. The crowd cheered when Yamamoto Takeshi scored a point by spiking a volley ball on the other side of the net. Even with Yamamoto's outstanding athletic skills, the team representing class 1-A was struggling against class 1-C.

Kojima Ran watched the volley ball match with interest. It seemed that Minoru and Yamamoto succeeded in getting Sawada Tsunayoshi to join them in playing the game.

He winced as he saw Tsuna get hit by the ball hard on the head. Now, he could finally see that Sawada was really horrible with sports, watching Sawada epically fail at serving, blocking, and even simply returning the ball.

Kojima could feel his classmates murmuring amongst themselves in disappointment. They obviously did not expect Tsuna to perform so badly. What happened to the hero who beat up an upperclassman bully?

Class 1-A lost to class 1-C three to twenty-one when the first set was over.

Kojima could see Tsuna's teammates get angry at him and question him about his efforts.

"I-I actually sprained my ankle in the match with Mochida-senpai…"

_There are four more sets to go at least, _Kojima thought optimistically.

He really liked to play and observe any sport that involved some kind of object being tossed around which often is a sphere. It was pretty thrilling to watch people to score points against each other, especially when both sides show a lot of teamwork, effort, and brilliant play. It was not turning out to be such a game yet to Kojima since one side was dominating and it was not as exciting to watch.

There was blue light. Tsuna suddenly fell when he returned to the court. Was he tripping over his own feet or something? The referee started the second set once both teams were ready. He blew the whistle.

Class-C served the volleyball.

"Tsuna! Block it!" Yamamoto told Sawada. Sawada nodded his head. Tsuna ran towards the net.

_His eyes… _Kojima noted a change in him as he watched Sawada run.

Tsuna jumped as one of the opponents went to strike the ball. Amazingly, he jumped much higher than usual, even higher than normal. Everyone was shocked. He blocked the ball with his private part.

"Crotch block! TRUE PASSION!" Kojima heard from the guy next to him. He had short white hair, a scar across his left eyebrow, a strip of white tape across his nose, had his fists wrapped in white bandages, and he was taller.

"That must hurt." Kojima said, wincing.

Even though Sawada had to go through a lot of pain with that crotch block, his teammates were pleased with his efforts. The next few sets favored Class-A. Seeing the well-known loser finally do his best for his team definitely pulled everyone together. Class-A won!

"We did it Tsuna!" Yamamoto said happily. "You're really amazing." They smiled at each other and laughed together.

"…Takeshi..…Family…..managed to…friends." Kojima picked up a squeaky voice with his ears. He had always been sensitive to sound. Who was talking?

Kojima made his way back to an ancient-looking traditional Japanese house. He tried the door. It didn't budge at all and he sighed. He had completely forgotten about asking for the extra set of house keys in the morning and he wasn't sure whether or not his grandparents would be at home.

"Grandpa? Grandma? It's me!" Kojima called out. He waited outside, unsure whether or not he was heard. His patience was rewarded when he heard footsteps approaching the door. His grandpa unlocked the door and slid the door open.

"Thank you," he said as his grandpa smiled at him and turned to head further back into the house. His grandfather suddenly froze in his tracks. He doubled back towards the boy lightening fast for an old man before Kojima could even step into the house. His grandpa stared in astonishment at him. Kojima was surprised at his grandad's expression.

"What?" Kojima asked, puzzled.

Grandpa was almost speechless. "…you…..I thought…I thought you were dead!"

"Huh? What the heck are you talking abou…" Then, it hit Kojima. "Oh shoot…Grandpa, I'll explain in the house okay?"

Kojima's grandfather could think of nothing else to do so he simply nodded. As Kojima took off his shoes and put on some slippers, his grandfather closed the door behind him.


End file.
